A Rehabilitation of Say’s Law (W. H. Hutt)

A Rehabilitation of Say’s Law (W. H. Hutt)

- Highlight Loc. 1391-97  | Added on Tuesday, March 27, 2012, 08:43 PM

H. G. Browne’s 1931 contribution, Economic Science and the Common Welfare, quoted at some length on this issue by Leland Yeager,4 also contains a beautifully clear exposition of the point. “The inactivity of all,” said Lavington, “is the cause of the inactivity of each. No entrepreneur can fully expand his output until others expand their output.”5 And this implies that the path to recovery, whether or not inflation is avoided, will be the determination of all input and all output prices in the light of existing, not ultimate, entrepreneurial prospects, i.e., when prices compatible with market-clearing requirements are determined.

malinvestment comum

A Rehabilitation of Say’s Law (W. H. Hutt)

- Highlight Loc. 1365-66  | Added on Tuesday, March 27, 2012, 08:37 PM

It is always possible for a greater original value to have been invested in certain assets than would have occurred if future demands for their services (or future prices of complementary services) had been accurately foreseen.

The basic cause of depression

A Rehabilitation of Say’s Law (W. H. Hutt)

- Highlight Loc. 1207-8  | Added on Monday, March 26, 2012, 05:53 PM

The reality is, then, that depression can emerge only through an interruption of the stream of “supplies” any interruption of the “stream of spending” being an effect—not a cause.

CARTA DE LUCIUS ANNAEUS SENECA PARA LUIS INACIO CAESAR

CARTA DE LUCIUS ANNAEUS SENECA PARA LUIS INACIO CAESAR  (soaressilva.apostos.com)

- Highlight Loc. 37-44  | Added on Sunday, March 25, 2012, 07:18 PM

“Mas e daí?”, você pergunta. “O Sócrates não disse “Sou burro mas sou feliz, mais burro é quem me diz?” Nesse ponto devo dizer que Sócrates nem disse que era burro, nem que quem o acusava de burro era ainda mais burro do que ele, tendo dito algo diferente tanto em palavras quanto em sentido. “Não quero saber,” você diz sem me ouvir, “é ripa na xulipa”. Mas assim como pode-se dizer com segurança que nem burro, nem feliz, também é o caso de dizer que nem ripa, nem xulipa; pois como disse o poeta, Aunt numerum lupus aut torrentia flumina riparum, Stant et iuniperi et castanae Xulipae…. Coisa que faz mais sentido do que a sua afirmação frequente de que “é vamos que vamos”, que muitos atribuem erradamente ao oráculo de Cumae sem saber que se trata mais provavelmente de sons postos arbitrariamente juntos, como o gargarejar espasmódico de um epiléptico ou o cacarejar de um galo. Além disso, Sócrates tinha todos os dedos.

money to hold (not to spend)

A Rehabilitation of Say’s Law (W. H. Hutt)

- Highlight Loc. 1078  | Added on Sunday, March 25, 2012, 07:11 PM

it is the demand for money to hold (not to spend) which determines the value of the money unit;

it's not spending that drive prices

A Rehabilitation of Say’s Law (W. H. Hutt)

- Highlight Loc. 1077-84  | Added on Sunday, March 25, 2012, 07:11 PM

It will help to clarify the issue if we consider the significance of spending. Given any “money supply,” it is the demand for money to hold (not to spend) which determines the value of the money unit; and given the demand for money to hold, it is monetary policy which, in determining the “money supply,” determines the value of the unit. Spending is incidental. If prices in general rise, then in such transactions as must be made through spending, an increased number of money units must be offered for any quantum of non-money. Each price established represents what must be spent if a good is to be sold and purchased. The increased spending is, then, a consequence not a cause. It is the valuing process, not the spending (which follows the valuing) that determines prices. The truth of this proposition is established by the fact that all present prices are influenced by expectations of future prices. Another proof is that the prices of goods often change in a market which is closed for a period during which no spending on the goods could have occurred!

PRECIFICAÇÃO: o problema fundamental da economia

A Rehabilitation of Say’s Law (W. H. Hutt)

- Highlight Loc. 1072-77  | Added on Sunday, March 25, 2012, 07:09 PM

The “monetarists” think in terms of an “adequate” money supply which can at any rate assist in maintaining the continuity of the market-clearing process while pure “Keynesians” say that it is an “adequate” rate of spending that matters. But the crucial continuity is always dependent upon valuing and pricing, whether or not monetary policy is flexible, rigid, inflationary or deflationary—i.e., independently of the factors which determine the purchasing power of the money unit. Certainly some monetary policies facilitate the process—at a cost—while others make it more difficult.

Mona e sua coleguinha

A Bacante da Boca do Lixo (Outros Escritos da Virada do Milênio) (Portuguese Edition) (Yuri Vieira)

- Highlight Loc. 1654-59  | Added on Sunday, March 25, 2012, 10:22 AM

E, finalmente, para gáudio estético e refrigério da cabeça de cima, e gládio tentador para a de baixo, chego no estúdio e me deparo com Mona e sua coleguinha, ambas modelos da agência L’Equipe, diante do fundo infinito, preparadas para a sessão de fotos de lingerie do catálogo do Carrefour. Diz o composite desta homônima da amante judia de Henry Miller: altura 1.70, manequim 36, busto 88, cintura 61, quadril 93, sapatos 38, olhos verdes, cabelos castanhos escuros. Ai... Uma delas, diante do meu olhar de Mister Hyde, sorri. Algumas mulheres parecem gostar de apanhar com os olhos. Se eu estivesse alegrinho, seria ignorado. Nada como uma hora após a outra.

especulação requer fibra

Doug Casey on the Illusion of Recovery  (lewrockwell.com)

- Highlight Loc. 173-76  | Added on Sunday, March 25, 2012, 07:45 AM

Most investors just don't have the strength of conviction to be good speculators. Instead of looking at the world to understand what's going on and placing intelligent bets on the logical consequences of the trends, regardless of what anyone else says or does, they go with the herd, buying when everyone else is buying and selling when everyone else is selling.

Brazilian stupidity

Doug Casey on the Illusion of Recovery  (lewrockwell.com)

- Highlight Loc. 135-37  | Added on Sunday, March 25, 2012, 07:43 AM

I love Argentina and spend a lot of time down here. It's a fantastic place to live – but not because of the government's economic policies. Its only competition in state stupidity is Brazil, which regularly detroys its currency.

Greece solution

Doug Casey on the Illusion of Recovery  (lewrockwell.com)

- Highlight Loc. 82-87  | Added on Sunday, March 25, 2012, 07:39 AM

I advocate the Greek government defaulting, overtly and immediately, on 100% of its debt, for several reasons. First, it would punish those who lent it money to do all the stupid and destructive things it's done. Second, it would ensure that the Greek government wouldn't be able to borrow again for a very long time. Third, it would liberate young and yet unborn Greeks, who are being turned into serfs by all that debt. It would also mean that most European banks would fail. Tough luck for those who relied on them.

benefits of money

A Rehabilitation of Say’s Law (W. H. Hutt)

- Highlight Loc. 1014-17  | Added on Sunday, March 25, 2012, 07:29 AM

Surely the use of money not only solves the difficulties due to the absence of “double coincidence of wants” but enormously eases the process of adjusting the values (prices) demanded for things offered or the values (prices) offered for things demanded (in response to changes in preference or changes in supply conditions).

lei de Say é isto: auto-ajuste pós crise

A Rehabilitation of Say’s Law (W. H. Hutt)

- Highlight Loc. 915-16  | Added on Sunday, March 25, 2012, 07:18 AM

under the conditions I have imagined, any market-pressured price cut, i.e., any increased supply, will tend to initiate a positive “real multiplier” effect—a cumulative rise in activity and real income,

expenditures: changes in the ownership of money

A Rehabilitation of Say’s Law (W. H. Hutt)

- Highlight Loc. 913-14  | Added on Sunday, March 25, 2012, 07:18 AM

The reasons in this case are unconnected with the Keynesian multiplier thesis, which depends upon “expenditures”—changes in the ownership of money.

THE STATE

The State (FRANZ OPPENHEIMER)

- Highlight Loc. 397-400  | Added on Sunday, March 25, 2012, 07:11 AM

The State, completely in its genesis, essentially and almost completely during the first stages of its existence, is a social institution, forced by a victorious group of men on a defeated group, with the sole purpose of regulating the dominion of the victorious group over the vanquished, and securing itself against revolt from within and attacks from abroad. Teleologically, this dominion had no other purpose than the economic exploitation of the vanquished by the victors.

Chego a Sentir Saudade dos Jegues

Chego a Sentir Saudade dos Jegues  (alexandresoaressilva.wordpress.com)

- Highlight Loc. 36-38  | Added on Sunday, March 25, 2012, 12:22 AM

E por aí vai, me parecem todos assim ultimamente. Mas que sei eu, nem leio tantos livros contemporâneos assim, imagino que há exceções. Ó homem das exceções, sei que há exceções. Sempre vem alguém me aborrecer com exceções.

REMOER

Chego a Sentir Saudade dos Jegues  (alexandresoaressilva.wordpress.com)

- Highlight Loc. 21-22  | Added on Sunday, March 25, 2012, 12:20 AM

De fato, ele tem uma mente e, senhores, se preparem porque ela vai REMOER (a literatura contemporânea não vê, não ouve, ela remói).

buying cars the way we buy governments

Rothbard's "Left and Right": Forty Years Later  (mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 306-9  | Added on Saturday, March 24, 2012, 11:58 PM

Imagine buying cars the way we buy governments. Ten thousand people would get together and agree to vote, each for the car he preferred. Whichever car won, each of the ten thousand would have to buy it. It would not pay any of us to make any serious effort to find out which car was best; whatever I decide, my car is being picked for me by the other members of the group.[15]

preparando o leitor para a besteira que você vai falar

Scott Adams Blog: Universal Password Formula 03/21/2012  (dilbert.com)

- Highlight Loc. 5-7  | Added on Saturday, March 24, 2012, 05:17 PM

Allow me to describe one potential solution. Then, according to tradition, you can tell me how stupid it is. Consider the idea that follows as nothing more than the inspiration for you own better idea that you will triumphantly put in the comments.

the term "anarchism" has the advantage of sounding exciting and radical

Rothbard's "Left and Right": Forty Years Later  (mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 222-23  | Added on Saturday, March 24, 2012, 05:07 PM

the term "anarchism" has the advantage of sounding exciting and radical, which gives it a certain appeal, especially among the young.

êee "capitalismo"

Rothbard's "Left and Right": Forty Years Later  (mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 204-7  | Added on Saturday, March 24, 2012, 05:05 PM

In short, the term "capitalism" as generally used conceals an assumption that the prevailing system is a free market. And since the prevailing system is in fact one of government favoritism toward business, the ordinary use of the term carries with it the assumption that the free market is government favoritism toward business.

"capitalismo"

Rothbard's "Left and Right": Forty Years Later  (mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 203-4  | Added on Saturday, March 24, 2012, 05:04 PM

By "capitalism" most people mean neither the free market simpliciter nor the prevailing neomercantilist system simpliciter. Rather, what most people mean by "capitalism" is this free-market system that currently prevails in the western world.

Molinari sobre os socialistas.

Rothbard's "Left and Right": Forty Years Later  (mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 66-72  | Added on Saturday, March 24, 2012, 04:48 PM

In an 1848 "Letter to Socialists" Molinari wrote: We are adversaries, and yet the goal which we both pursue is the same. What is the common goal of economists [i.e., classical liberals] and socialists? Is it not a society where the production of all the goods necessary to the maintenance and embellishment of life shall be as abundant as possible, and where the distribution of these same goods among those who have created them through their labor shall be as just as possible? … Only we approach this goal by different paths…. Why do you refuse to follow the path of liberty alongside us? … If you became certain that you had been mistaken as to the true cause of the evils which afflict society and the means of remedying them … you would come over to us.[4]

Lech Walesa sobre Lula

A Bacante da Boca do Lixo (Outros Escritos da Virada do Milênio) (Portuguese Edition) (Yuri Vieira)

- Highlight Loc. 1356-61  | Added on Friday, March 23, 2012, 06:10 AM

Mas, sabendo-se um ponta-de-lança, ¿conhecerá Lula a verdadeira natureza do cabo desta lança? ¿Será que ― em meio a carícias chavistas e castristas ― realmente captou o que Walesa tão bem exprimiu numa entrevista recente? Nesta, Walesa definiu ― através de uma metáfora (tropo tão apreciado por Lula) ― a diferença entre suas intenções e as de Lula. Walesa disse que levar um país do capitalismo ao socialismo, processo que Lula pregou a vida inteira, é como transformar um aquário numa sopa de peixes. Basta colocar fogo por baixo. Agora, transformar uma sopa de peixes num aquário é tarefa dificílima, exatamente a que ele empreendeu com as bençãos de João Paulo II.

libertarian activism louco

Dialog on libertarian activism:  (web.archive.org)

- Highlight Loc. 20-27  | Added on Thursday, March 22, 2012, 05:32 AM

I believe that libertarians simply must start by actually doing active, daily self-government and educating their own children in spite of and without the permission or tolerance of the statists, up to and including going to jail or whatever. I'm convinced that a lot of the nonsense_ we seem forced to endure stems from a lack of effort on the part of most people to maintain full charge/responsibility for their own lives. For instance, most people tend to cry for government regulation of safety and health issues, rather than to take responsibility to educate themselves as consumers. When enough people take this responsibility first and stop looking to government for solutions, when they begin to resist statists' agendas for their lives and resist giving them their money in any form, then they can begin to hope for freedom. It won't happen magically through "education," but only by the gut effort of everyone who wants to be free.... and when there are enough of us....

Bernanke’s Deep Understanding

Bernanke’s Deep Understanding  (bastiat.mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 15-17  | Added on Wednesday, March 21, 2012, 09:26 PM

The Fed Chair admitted that the gold standard provides price stability–but only in the long run.  He stressed that there have been short-term periods of price inflation and deflation under gold.  Well sure, prices increase and then correct, that’s what a gold standard does.  Under central bank management prices just increase;

A Bacante da Boca do Lixo (Outros Escritos da Virada do Milênio) (Portuguese Edition) (Yuri Vieira)

- Highlight Loc. 741-42  | Added on Monday, March 19, 2012, 08:00 PM

na Jovem Pan, alguém dizia que a luz havia voltado. Alarme falso, era apenas a usina de emergência do Tietê, uma usina movida provavelmente à bosta, uma central Merdelétrica.

A Bacante da Boca do Lixo (Outros Escritos da Virada do Milênio) (Portuguese Edition) (Yuri Vieira)

- Highlight Loc. 564-66  | Added on Monday, March 19, 2012, 07:33 PM

Se ainda fosse uma bicha louca bandida tipo Madame Satã, que sai dando testada viada por aí, falando “minha pessoa” toda vez que fala de si mesma, ainda teria algum glamour, afinal, nada mais in do que ser gay, bandido e rebelde.

The accommodation freed the housing sector from having to draw investment funds from other sectors.

Krugman on Friedman: An Austrain Approach  (bastiat.mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 31-33  | Added on Sunday, March 18, 2012, 05:06 PM

The fact that the Greenspan Fed adopted a loose monetary stance in the wake of the dot.com bust and well into the century’s first decade was a game changer. The accommodation freed the housing sector from having to draw investment funds from other sectors.

"eles querem resolver tudo com lei" 2

Version 5.2  (econfaculty.gmu.edu)

- Highlight Loc. 13-14  | Added on Friday, March 16, 2012, 10:21 PM

In existing States a fresh law is looked upon as a remedy for evil. Instead of themselves altering what is bad, people begin by demanding a law to alter it.

preço não é mágica

A Rehabilitation of Say’s Law (W. H. Hutt)

- Highlight Loc. 717-18  | Added on Friday, March 16, 2012, 10:20 AM

pressures tending to bring about the pricing needed for market clearance cannot be expected to work instantaneously, especially after long periods in which policy has been designed to reduce or restrain the required pressures.

market clearing prices

A Rehabilitation of Say’s Law (W. H. Hutt)

- Highlight Loc. 753-54  | Added on Friday, March 16, 2012, 10:20 AM

“Market-clearing prices” are, as we have seen, compatible with the accumulation of inventories when investment in this form is judged to be the most profitable form of replacement or net accumulation at any moment,

the welfare of your friends causes you pleasure because it's part of your good, not vice versa

Economics and Its Ethical Assumptions  (mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 256-59  | Added on Thursday, March 15, 2012, 03:15 PM

Aristotle would say that your life's being an objective success includes the well-being of your friends. It's not that the well-being of your friends causes you some jollies — it does, sure, but that's not all there is to it. In fact, he would say that the welfare of your friends causes you pleasure because it's part of your good, not vice versa — that pleasure is a byproduct of getting what you think is good rather than the opposite.

a utilidade do seguro de vida

Economics and Its Ethical Assumptions  (mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 241-45  | Added on Thursday, March 15, 2012, 03:13 PM

Now obviously someone could say: well, wait a second, you get pleasure out of the thought that your loved ones will do well after your death, right? Yeah, that's true. So here's something, the belief that my loved ones will do well. And that causes pleasure. And maybe that's part of my reason for buying life insurance. But is it really plausible to say it's really that belief rather than their actually doing well? Because one isn't a means to the other. Your loved ones' doing well in the future can't be a cause of your belief that they'll do well now, unless you believe in backward causation.

sobre um único objetivo na vida

Economics and Its Ethical Assumptions  (mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 209-18  | Added on Thursday, March 15, 2012, 03:09 PM

Now according to this tradition, why do they say that we have just one ultimate end? Why not say that we have lots, that there are lots of things we want: ice cream, fame, not being killed? We've got all these different things, but why suppose that they're all constituents of some big super-end? Well, I think part of the reason they think this is: what happens when you make trade-offs? Suppose there are two ultimate ends you have: ice cream and fame. Those are two ultimate ends you have, and they come in degrees. (That's why I didn't use not being killed, because that's less a matter of degree.) So you want more ice cream, and you want more fame. And sometimes those go together, like winning an ice-cream-eating contest. But still there are lots of cases where these goals might conflict, and so you have to do trade-offs, and decide between them. If you're deciding between them, that's an action. Actions have to have a means-end structure, right? So if you're trying to decide how to trade off between ice cream and fame, then doing that must be a means to some end. Well, what is the end? It can't be the end of maximizing the ice cream, because you haven't decided whether that's what you're going to do. It can't be the end of maximizing fame, because you haven't decided that.

morality

Economics and Its Ethical Assumptions  (mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 196-98  | Added on Thursday, March 15, 2012, 03:04 PM

Morality stands to the ultimate human good as playing one note stands to playing the whole sonata — or actually, probably as playing two-thirds of the sonata stands to the whole sonata (or if you're a Stoic, as playing the entire sonata stands to playing the entire sonata).

eudaimonia

Economics and Its Ethical Assumptions  (mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 189-96  | Added on Thursday, March 15, 2012, 03:04 PM

There's this tradition I call the eudaimonic tradition, from the Greek word for happiness or well-being, eudaimonia. And this is a tradition that runs through Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, and it runs on through the medieval philosophers and the Scholastics, Aquinas and so forth; in fact it's the dominant ethical tradition of the first 2,000 years of Western philosophy. It's not until after the end of the Middl Ages that it begins to be whittled away by new theories. And this is the view according to which there is an ultimate good, which usually gets called "happiness" — but that can be somewhat misleading, because it's not a pleasant feeling of satisfaction, although it may involve that — but it's a state of your life objectively going well, your life being an objective success, something like your being successful at living a good human life: that's what eudaimonia is. That's the ultimate good. And morality is not just an instrumental means to that good; it's actually part of it.

That's what Dr. Socrates would say.

Economics and Its Ethical Assumptions  (mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 75-77  | Added on Thursday, March 15, 2012, 02:47 PM

Socrates used to say that the doctor can tell you what's likely to make you live or die, but the doctor can't tell you whether you'd be better off alive or dead. That goes outside of the doctor's area of expertise. The philosopher tells you whether your life is worth living or not: "the unexamined life is not worth living," so if you're not examining your life, you're better off dead. That's what Dr. Socrates would say.

it's not part of the medical expertise to tell you whether health is a good thing

Economics and Its Ethical Assumptions  (mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 71-73  | Added on Thursday, March 15, 2012, 12:11 PM

of course it's not part of the medical expertise to tell you whether health is a good thing. Nowhere in medical school can you learn any reason for thinking health is a good thing.

"eles tentam resolver tudo com lei"

Equality: The Unknown Ideal  (mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 178-79  | Added on Wednesday, March 14, 2012, 08:00 PM

statists tend to treat governmental edicts as though they were incantations, passing directly from decree to result, without the inconvenience of means;

Justice is only one virtue among many, and libertarianism is only one application of justice

Equality: The Unknown Ideal  (mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 174-77  | Added on Wednesday, March 14, 2012, 07:59 PM

(Nor do I mean to suggest that libertarians are generally more virtuous than statists. Justice is only one virtue among many, and libertarianism is only one application of justice; so the only self-congratulatory moral we can draw is that we score higher on one aspect of one virtue than our statist colleagues do.)

statism as moral vice 2

Equality: The Unknown Ideal  (mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 172-74  | Added on Wednesday, March 14, 2012, 07:58 PM

But, again like racism and sexism, statism is the kind of moral vice that tends to enter the soul through self-deception, semi-conscious osmosis, and a kind of Arendtian banality, rather than through a forthright embrace; it is a form of spiritual blindness that can, and does, infect even those who are largely sincere and well-meaning.

statism as a moral vice

Equality: The Unknown Ideal  (mises.org)

- Highlight Loc. 171-72  | Added on Wednesday, March 14, 2012, 07:58 PM

I regard statism as being, at least in most cases, a moral vice, rather than a mere cognitive mistake, in much the same way that racism and sexism are moral vices, not mere cognitive mistakes.

that necessarily means changes in relative prices

A Rehabilitation of Say’s Law (W. H. Hutt)

- Highlight Loc. 662-65  | Added on Monday, March 12, 2012, 10:38 AM

A tenaciously held view is that Say’s law dogmatically assumes away the reality of “underconsumption.” But variations in saving-preference (i.e., in the propensity to consume) are irrelevant to the law. Changes in all preferences, unless responded to by changes in resource allocation (and that necessarily means changes in relative prices), result in the disco-ordination of the economy—a less fruitful utilization of productive capacity, including the emergence of wasteful and sometimes chronic idleness.

chora, estado de equilíbrio

REALISM AND ABSTRACTION IN ECONOMICS  (william)

- Highlight on Page 18 | Added on Monday, March 12, 2012, 01:28 AM

What happens in the ERE is not supposed to be a good predictor of what happens in real-world economies; quite the contrary.

false assumptions areuseful in economic theory, but only when they are used as auxiliary constructs

REALISM AND ABSTRACTION IN ECONOMICS  (william)

- Highlight on Page 17 | Added on Monday, March 12, 2012, 01:23 AM

As Rothbard writes, “false assumptions areuseful in economic theory, but only when they are used as auxiliary constructs, not as premises from which empirical theories can be deduced” (Rothbard 1997, p.

ninguém nunca pressupôs um "homo economicus", bróder

REALISM AND ABSTRACTION IN ECONOMICS  (william)

- Highlight on Page 14 | Added on Monday, March 12, 2012, 01:07 AM

The classicals were not really such fools as to suppose that “self-interested” and “altruistic” motives can be cleanly separated into different compartments of life; but they did regard the hypothesis of pure self-interest as a good enough predictor of people’s behavior in the business world.

the book would not have encountered the upward force were it not for the downward force

REALISM AND ABSTRACTION IN ECONOMICS  (william)

- Highlight on Page 13 | Added on Monday, March 12, 2012, 01:01 AM

6Here one must make the qualification: unless its being pulled downward causes it to encounter a countervailing force it would not otherwise have encountered—e.g., colliding with an obstacle and so rebounding in the opposite direction. A similar qualification applies in the economic case: if “an increased supply of tomatoes (accidentally) causes an increase of demand for these tomatoes,” then “it is not necessarily the case that the tomato price is lower than it otherwise would be” (Hülsmann 2003, p. 74, p. 77, n. 24). Yet even if this means that ceteris paribusclauses cannot be eliminated entirely, their scope is certainly narrowed. As for the case of gravity, the above qualification incidentally provides an answer to an objection raised by an anonymous referee: if an object (say, a book) is resting on a table, can we still say that the object ends up five feet further downward than it would have without the influence of gravity? Yes, in the following sense: the downward force that the book exerts on the table is exactly offset by the upward force that the table exerts on the book. If the book were to encounter that same upward force without the downward force, than after the relevant interval it would be five feet higher up than it is now. However, in this case the book would not have encountered the upward force were it not for the downward force; hence the above-mentioned qualification.